[URBAN NOTE] “Downed elevators plague Aura condo, residents say”

The Toronto Star‘s Alex Ballingall reports about the problems at the new Aura condo tower.

Jim McNally lives 77 storeys above Yonge St. Through his floor-to-ceiling windows he looks down on Queen’s Park and the University of Toronto, and on a clear day he can spot distant planes on the tarmac at Pearson. The family physician says he put “all his marbles” into the condominium and much prefers the downtown locale to an alternative in the suburbs.

But life at such great heights hasn’t been so great lately.

It’s the elevators.

McNally doesn’t trust them.

There have been periodic problems since he moved in about a year and a half ago, McNally told the Star in an interview, but since a powerful rainstorm hit Toronto last Monday, the lifts’ lack of lifting has hit a new low. Of the nine elevators that serve the 79 floors of the Aura tower at Yonge and Gerrard Sts.—a building with billboards that boast: “Canada’s Tallest Condominium”—three have been broken for more than eight days, said McNally, who sits on the condo board.

For those like him that live above the 55th storey, only one elevator works—sort of. As of Tuesday afternoon, it was manned by a kindly security guard on a stool, who would pilot the elevator to the requested floor, stopping at every fifth storey on the way down to pick up any departing residents. If you want to go down, you can call the concierge and ask for the lift to be sent to your floor, or you can take the stairs to one of the storeys where the elevator is scheduled to stop.